Tag Archives: Benghazi

May 6 2015

Freedom of Speech: Introduction


By Prof. Paul Eidelberg

A lot of sophomoric trite has been uttered in the media about freedom of speech in reaction to the terrorist attack at Muhammad Cartoon Contest in Garland, Texas, 3 May, 2015. Let’s be serious about a most serious subject.

Freedom of speech is of course a fundamental human value.  This value seems to have its home in liberal democracy. In fact, liberal democracy exalts freedom of speech over all other values. Unfortunately, the exaltation of this freedom has led to its degradation. Today, freedom of speech lacks rational and ethical constraints.  Divorced from truth, freedom of speech has become a license not only to lie but even to incite people to murder, as witness Harvard’s defense of Oxford poetaster Tom Paulin who urged that Jews living in Judea/Samaria “should be shot dead”.

To redeem and elevate freedom of speech, let’s explore its pristine origin, the Bible of Israel.

Recall Abraham’s questioning the justice of G-d’s decision to destroy Sodom:  “Peradventure there are fifty righteous within the city; wilt Thou indeed sweep away and not forgive the place for the fifty righteous that are therein?  That be far from Thee to do after this manner, to slay the righteous with the wicked, that so the righteous should be as the wicked; that be far from Thee; shall not the Judge of all earth do justly?”

G-d permits Abraham to question Him.  By so doing, the King of Kings affirms freedom of speech as a fundamental human right.  But clearly this right, from a Judaic perspective, can only be derived from man’s creation in the image of G-d. Only because man is endowed with reason and free will does he have a right to freedom of speech.  This right, however, must be understood in terms of the purpose or function of speech.

Speech is not an end-in-itself or mere exercise in self-expression. Rightly understood, speech is a manifestation of reason, the quintessential function of which is to communicate ideas and inquire into their truth or falsity, their justice or injustice.  Hence, speech is an intellectual-moral phenomenon.  To divorce speech from truth is to relegate this distinctively human faculty to a mere instrument of self-aggrandizement and to reject the biblical concept of man’s creation in the image of G-d.  This is the current tendency of liberal democracy, a tendency that degrades man and makes a mockery of his right to freedom of speech.

It cannot be said too often – it is hardly said at all – that if freedom of speech is divorced from truth, democracy is no more justifiable than tyranny.  More precisely, if there are no objective standards by which to distinguish right from wrong, or modesty from shamelessness – whether in speech or in behavior – then there are no rational grounds for preferring democracy to totalitarianism.

Notice, moreover, that the denial of objective moral standards does not logically justify the toleration of all lifestyles. Moral relativism undermines any objective grounds for preferring tolerance to intolerance, hence freedom of speech to censorship.

It has been said that the only rational defense of freedom of speech or of intellectual freedom is that it can facilitate the quest for truth, including the truth about how man should live.  But no such quest can even begin unless we already know, in some general and authoritative way, what is right and wrong.  Clearly, the claim to academic freedom can have no justification unless it is commonly understood that it is wrong to cheat or deceive, to plagiarize or steal, to defame or murder.  This suggests that moral relativists, who very much dominate the academic world, take civilization for granted.

The true father of civilization is none other than Abraham who, by discovering the Creator of man, discovered the moral unity of human nature.  The moral unity of human nature presupposes the rule of reason over self-regarding passions, of moral suasion over brute force and arbitrariness.  It is in this light that we are to understand the destruction of Sodom.  G-d tolerates Abraham’s questioning because Abraham’s speech is not a mere ventilation of emotion. To be sure, Abraham is the exemplar of compassion. But Abraham’s compassion is informed by truth, that is, by his knowing the difference between righteousness and wickedness.  Apart from such knowledge, freedom of speech is noise or nonsense.

–  –  –  –

To be continued

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May 5 2015

On Dealing with Obama?


By Prof. Paul Eidelberg

Let us assume, to begin with, that Islam influences Obama’s behavior.  For some observers of Islam, this assumption does not flatter Mr. Obama.

For example, Syrian-born psychiatrist Wafa Sultan has said, in a derogatory sense, that Islam is not a civilization.

Dutch parliamentarian Geert Wilders agrees. He denied the existence of a clash of civilizations between Islam and the West because Islam, he says, is not a civilization but a form of barbarism.

Now ponder this. That Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said there is no clash of civilization in the Middle East suggests the possibility that he may harbor a fallacious hence precarious understanding of Islam, one that has induced him to engage in peace negotiations with the Islamic Palestinian Authority for more than two decades, despite the absence of any positive results, to say nothing of the terrible loss of Jewish life.

That Wafa Sultan and Geert Wilders have a more candid – I do not say clearer – understanding of Islam, is confirmed by this report of Dr. Arieh Eldad, an M.D. at Hadassah Hospital in Israel.

I was instrumental in establishing the “Israeli National Skin Bank,” which is the largest in the world. The National Skin Bank stores skin for every day needs as well as for war time or mass casualty situations. This skin bank is hosted at the Hadassah Ein Kerem University hospital in Jerusalem where I was the Chairman of plastic surgery.

This is how I was asked to supply skin for an Arab woman from Gaza, who was hospitalized in Soroka Hospital in Beersheva, after her family burned her. Usually, such atrocities happen among Arab families when the women are suspected of having an affair. We supplied all the needed Homografts for her treatment. She was successfully treated by my friend and colleague, Prof. Lior Rosenberg and discharged to return to Gaza. She was invited for regular follow-up visits to the outpatient clinic in Beersheva.

One day she was caught at a border crossing wearing a suicide belt. She meant to explode herself in the outpatient clinic of the hospital where they saved her life. It seems that her family promised her that if she did that, they would forgive her.

This is only one example of the war between Jews and Muslims in the Land of Israel. It is not a territorial conflict.

Dr. Eldad concluded his report by asking everyone to forward it onwards so that as many as possible will understand radical Islam, that this not merely a territorial conflict. [As Geert Wilders put it, “this is a  war between civilization & barbarism.”]

Now, returning to Obama, the question arises: how does one deal with an individual who has been described as an “empty suit”? Such an individual can hardly be called a real person, since he has no solid identity. He may speak like a human being, but he is just as likely to speak honestly as dishonestly, sensibly as well as foolishly – as when Obama said he was a Muslim and that America was founded by Muslims!

What such an individual says should therefore be taken with a grain of salt. One can’t safely rely on what he says as a basis for policy.  Any conversation with Obama should be as brief and as casual as possible. Also, anything he says should not only be recorded, but also witnessed, if possible, by a third party.  One must never assume that Obama means what he says and says what he means, or that even understands what he says or means – from one day to the next. This is the dilemma in dealing with an “empty suit.”

It follows that Israel must reduce to a minimum her dealings with American officials insofar as such dealings may be intersected by whatever Obama, by chance or by design, may say or do. This means that Israel should regard Obama as a punctuated or virtual enemy.

 

Apr 29 2015

Ankit Panda: What Really Happened in the Persian Gulf on April 28, 2015?


There is much going on here that have consequences that are not good associated with them.

Pundit Planet's avatarpundit from another planet

USS_Farragut;99_Turn_BurnAnkit Panda writes: A 65,000 ton, Danish-owned, Singapore-chartered, container ship, en route to the United Arab Emirates from Saudi Arabia, manned mostly by Eastern European and Asian sailors, is intercepted, boarded, and confiscated by the Iranian navy, prompting a U.S. destroyer to investigate.*

“Iran’s reasons for seizing the ship were at first unclear. Speculation abounded that the incident was a show of force intended to strike back at the United States after it sent the USS Theodore Roosevelt to intercept an Iranian arms shipment to Yemen’s Houthis last week.” 

That wasn’t an anecdote from Tom Friedman’s next book on globalization–it’s a rough description of what took place on Tuesday, April 28, in the strategically important sea lanes of the Strait of Hormuz.

“Additionally, others suggested that the seizure could have been a move by hardliners opposing Iran’s negotiations with the West over its nuclear program  –  an attempt to spark a broader crisis…

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Apr 29 2015

Warning Signs: Israel Will Attack Iran Soon


I also agree the Israel will have to so what Obama never will he supports Iran every time he gets a chance.

christinewjc's avatarTalk Wisdom

While checking out some of the headlines from my former blog’s links, I found an important article written by Alan Caruba at his blog Warning Signs. Found the article via Noisy Room.

I have thought for some time now that Israel will eventually be the nation that will need to take out the nuclear reactors in Iran. Our current resident at the White House (and his boss – Valerie Jarrett) will need to “save face” and claim that a deal (no matter how awful it will probably be!) has been made with the taqiyya Mullahs of that Islamic terrorist regime; leaving the entire world vulnerable to the Islamist fanatics!

When I read Alan’s name, it sounded familiar to me. Years ago, I think that he may have been a friend on Facebook. Since I don’t venture into that social media realm anymore, I’m glad that I found his blog!

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Apr 28 2015

Large-scale Egyptian army massed for operation to capture eastern Libya from ISIS


Re-Post DEBKAfile Exclusive Report April 26, 2015, 6:20 PM

ISIS in occupation of Libyan town of Derna

The Middle East is on the brink of its fourth war (after Syria, Iraq and Yemen). debkafile’s military and intelligence sources report that Egypt is massing large-scale ground and air forces in the Western Desert along the Libyan border, in preparation for a military campaign to capture eastern Libya – Cyrenaica – from the Islamist State of Syria and Iraq – ISIS – occupation.

The substantial naval and marine forces assembling at Egypt’s Mediterranean ports indicate the possible launching of the offensive by dropping Egyptian marines on the Libyan coast around Derna (pop: 100,000), which ISIS has made its provincial capital. They may be accompanied by simultaneous landings of paratroops from the air. For President Abdel-Fatteh El-Sisi, ISIS’s presence in eastern Libya (as well as Sinai) poses an unacceptable peril to his country. He has been warned in a number of intelligence reports that the Islamic State’s terrorists have already penetrated some Egyptian towns and even infiltrated certain army units. To counter the Egyptian plan of campaign, ISIS is rushing reinforcements to eastern Libya from Syria and Iraq. From Syria, they are traveling by air or sea through the Mediterranean; from Iraq, through the Sinai Peninsula, whence oil and drug rings smuggle them across the Suez Canal and Egypt.
debkafile’s sources reveal that Egypt’s projected invasion of Libya was high on the agenda of American CIA Director John Brennan’s unannounced visit to Cairo on April 19 for a meeting with the president. In reply to his visitor’s demand for precise information on Egypt’s Libyan campaign. President El-Sisi offered an assurance that he had no intention of keeping the Egyptian army in Libya. He would pull the troops out after defeating and disarming the jihadis and hand power to the Libyan government, which has established its seat in the eastern town of Tobruk near the Egyptian border and home to Libyan military bases and oil terminals. The Tobruk government was set up by Libyan members of parliament who fled the capital Tripoli when it was overrun by a group of extremist Islamist militias, known as the Libyan Dawn, which included elements associated with Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb – AQIM. The head of the this government is Abdullah al-Thinni, who is recognized by the United States and most Western governments as the legitimate prime minister of Libya.
President El-Sisi was not surprised to hear from the CIA director that the Obama administration objects to a direct Egyptian invasion of Libya, but would not oppose Cairo acting through local Libyan militias. Brennan put forward the name of Gen. Khalifa Hifter, a Libyan-American, who set up a militia in the eastern Libyan town of Benghazi to fight the Islamists, aided by Libyan army units based in the region. On March 2, Prime Minister al-Thinni and the Tobruk parliament appointed Gen. Hifter commander-in-chief of the Libyan army, promoting him to the rank of lieutenant general. He was entrusted with two missions: To liberate Libya from the clutches of the Islamic militias and to rebuild the national army. debkafile’s military sources disclose that, for the past six months, the Egyptian president has given Hifter his support and even supplied him with weapons. But he does not see him as a sufficiently powerful and emblematic figure to unify the Libyan nation. Brennan leaned hard on the Egyptian president to follow Washington’s line, but El-Sisi refused. Their differences on the Libyan campaign were reflected by omission in the joint communiqué they issued after their conversation: After discussing “regional issues, terrorism and ways of enhancing bilateral relations, the two sides agreed to continue consultation and coordination on issues of mutual interest.”
Interestingly, Egypt is ready to throw ground, sea and air forces into its offensive in Libya, while at the same time abstaining from deploying air or ground power in the Yemeni conflict, although it is a member of the Saudi-led coalition fighting Iran-backed rebels. Egypt is already fighting the Islamic State’s branch in Sinai. It is now gearing up to tackle the Islamist peril on its western border.

Apr 28 2015

A Perilous Situation


Prof. Paul Eidelberg

Thanks primarily to President Barack Obama, Iran is on a short path to becoming a nuclear power. Iran will then become the rulers of the Middle East. The Mullocracy in Tehran will then control the oil resources on which the economy of Europe depends. Since Europe is America’s greatest trading partner, a nuclear Iran would be in a position to undermine the survival of the United States.

The Mullocracy of Iran, formerly Persia, is animated by uncompromising religious and imperial objectives. When Iran’s former president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, brazenly screamed “Death to America,” and also vowed to wipe Israel off the map, he was not engaging in grandiloquent rhetoric to inflate Iranian pride. His maledictions simply expressed Islam’s 1,400-year ambition to rule the world, an ambition more realistic than that expressed in Hitler’s Mein Kampf.

This being the case, the critics of Obama’s flimsy nuke agreement with Iran were quite right in comparing Obama to Chamberlain. However, if Obama is animated by the “Munich syndrome,” or if he harbors Islam’s desire to eradicate the “small Satan, Israel does not have to become a “one bomb state” or passively wait for dooms day.

Even if Obama is not a closet Jew-hater, he is clearly a hater of Western Civilization, symbolized by his return of a bust of Winston Churchill to London.  Such was Churchill’s greatness as a scholar-statesman that he was made an honorary citizen of the United States by President John F. Kennedy. Churchill was far more American than the current occupant of the White House!

Perhaps Obama’s animus toward Churchill may be attributed to British imperialism. Alternatively, perhaps Obama was aware of Churchill’s’ contempt for Islam. Indeed, Churchill once said that Islam “paralyses the social development of those who follow it. No stronger retrograde force exists in the world.”

In contrast, Churchill greatly admired the Jews. “Some people like the Jews,” he said, “and some do not. But no thoughtful man can deny the fact that they are, beyond any question, the most formidable and most remarkable race which has appeared in the world.”

It thus appears that Obama, who speaks glowingly of the Qur’an, and who genuflected to Saudi King Abdullah, had all the more reason to abhor a bust of Churchill on the one hand, and to support the Islamic Palestinian Authority’s war against Israel on the other! Nor is this all.

Obama, a radical left-wing Democrat, may also be cultivating a personal vendetta vis-à-vis Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. As is well known, Netanyahu was invited by Republican Speaker of the House John Boehner to address a joint session of Congress, surely to warn the Americans of Obama’s appeasement of Iran regarding its nuclear weapons program.

There is good reason to liken Obama’s appeasement of that tyranny with Chamberlain’s appeasement of Hitler at Munich. Whereas Hitler was rearming Germany in violation of the Versailles Treaty, Iran was acquiring more and more centrifuges for launching nuclear-tipped ballistic missiles in violation of an international treaty to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons and weapons technology.

After more than a decade of failed diplomacy exploited by Iran, there was no solid reason to believe that the U.S. could succeed in curtailing Iran’s nuclear ambition. Indeed, Iran’s obtaining nuclear weapons is consistent with Teheran’s malediction of “death to America” and its vow to wipe Israel off the map.

Since Iran is also the epicenter of international terrorism, it’s only a matter of prudence to regard Iran as the spearhead of Islam, whose world-historical mission is to eradicate Christianity and Judaism.  Therefore, it should be the objective of Israel to heed the advice of John Bolton, America’s sagacious former ambassador to United Nations.

Ponder this. Just before the presidency of George Bush Jr. came to an end, hence just before Obama’s first presidential inauguration, Bolton, who was experienced in arms control, wisely advised Israel to attack Iran, hopefully with help from the United States! However, Bolton understood that with Obama in the White House, no such attack would take place, and that Iran would have a free pass to becoming a nuclear power.

Indeed, it was to prevent this eventuality that House Speaker Boehner invited Prime Minster Netanyahu to address Congress. Boehner surely knew that at stake with an Obama Presidency was nothing less than the survival of Western civilization. This is probably what prompted him to take the unprecedented step of inviting a foreign statesman to address the U.S. Congress: he wanted Netanyahu to hamstring the President of the United States!

Therefore, given this assessment of the concerns and motives set forth in the previous paragraph, I venture to say that to save Western civilization from the scourge of Islam, Israel will have to destroy, in one way or another, Iran’s command and control centers along with its ballistic missile facilities – a daunting but utterly necessary task.

Apr 28 2015

A Wake-Up Call


By Paul Eidelberg

Is there any intelligent patriot in the United States unaware that the most important cause of America’s decline in foreign affairs is the same cause of the mayhem erupting in its domestic affairs?

Is there any intelligent person in America unaware that Barack Obama, who genuflected to Saudi King Abdulla, and who did not join other nations in Paris to protest against Islamic terrorism, is not qualified to deal with the Islamism  or with domestic mayhem, that he woefully lacking in political wisdom as well as in spiritual integrity?

Is there any intelligent person in this country unaware that what facilitated the election of this “post-American” President is precisely that which will prevent his impeachment?

How long will Americans tolerate a President who brazenly scorns their foundational documents, hence its Judeo-Christian way of life, while undermining America’s economic ability to preserve our freedom against a remorseless foe?

Apr 28 2015

Negress Mayor of Baltimore Calls on Police to Protect Rioters! (Video)


IF this is the quality of the politicians that we elect then we deserve what we get; and it will not be a free society like what we had but one with very tight control over every aspect of our lives..

Apr 27 2015

Afterburner with Bill Whittle: ‘The Class of 2015: Book Burners Afraid of Matches’


The millennials substitute one prejudice for another and the one they so dislike has stood in good stead for a long time and maybe it only needed some tweaks.

Malo periculosam libertatem quam quietum servitium

Apr 27 2015

The Media and Jihad


Every time that there is a major jihad attack, the media responds in the same way. There is now a routine that the authorities tell us:

  • Islam is the religion of peace
  • Muslims that do jihad are extremists and not real Muslims
  • Authorities must watch out for retaliation against Muslims
  • All religions are the same. The Christians are as bad or worse
  • We have not done enough to welcome Islam
  • Concessions will reduce jihad; we need to give Islam more concessions.